Social Media Tips for Students in Recruiting, College Admission

To help high school students understand how to leverage social media for a college admissions decision or with a team or even potential employer, it is important to understand that the young person you are addressing is likely not using social media in any sort of traditional or expected manner.

The Article You Were Expecting to Read
There is a widely accepted metric in the marketing industry that 96 percent of consumers do not trust advertising. They will, however, trust customer reviews that they read on sites such as Amazon and even the brand or company’s website where strangers give their rating and often explain their experience with the product. There is a parallel from this consumer behavior that is worth applying to personal brands, even for high school and college students.

The college application, the admissions essay, a highlight reel, test scores, community involvement, honors classes, even recommendation letters tell a fraction of a story. These don’t always share the real details about what a person will be like as a teammate, a classmate, a student and eventually an alum of an institution, team or program.

When compared to a product, this is the marketing and packaging messaging and isn’t the reviews of others. Even recommendation letters are not fully trusted as authentic but more of the preplanned marketing message. It’s important to have a solid package of admissions materials though, but a good reminder is that it is also expected and gives a very small glimpse into who a student really is and how the student will fit in and thrive on a college campus or on a team.

To build confidence in a decision, a coach, admissions counselor or program director may want to see more authenticity and a more holistic view of a person to determine if the person is a worthwhile addition to admission or onto a team beyond just past performance. Have you ever observed a collegiate coach when the coach travels to watch an athlete on the field of play? It isn’t just about the competition, individual performance or shaking hands with the player, parents or coach. The visit is a way to see a bigger picture of the athlete.

• Does the student take direction and redirection well?

• How does the student engage when on the bench?

• Does the student lead, follow or both?

• Is the student ethical in play and professional in interactions with the other team?

• Is the student respectful to everyone, including parents, despite the score?

Even a visit during the school day will tell a story about how the student is treated by others and treats others from classmates, teachers and staff.

Often you hear that character can be defined as what a person does when no one is watching. Those are the moments a coach can get a “gut feeling” about a player and how the player will fit into the culture of the locker room, not just onto the roster or field of competition. Much like the definition of character provided above, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is quoted as saying “personal brand is what people say about you when you aren’t in the room.” It’s our reputation.

Teenagers haven’t had time to build this necessarily, especially if they have spent much of their lives balancing the roles of student and athlete or practitioner. While past academic performance, such as grades and test scores, can predict future academic performance, college admissions teams and coaches are looking for predictors of future success as well: time management, adaptability, resilience, emotional intelligence, self-discipline and more.

The Article You Need to Read to Help Today’s Learner
Many have been warning today’s current generation that they could ruin their whole future with one misplaced social media blunder. They have grown up watching fake news, deep fake videos, internet trolls, 8-year-olds on YouTube becoming millionaires. They watched a polarized nation deal with elections, civil unrest, a global pandemic and many more sensational events.

As a result, the cohort doesn’t generally like to share on social media because it makes them vulnerable that doesn’t feel good to them. Often, they prefer what they believe to be expirable content on Snapchat, the comments on Instagram that are direct messages, and are often distrusting of people who share too much because they have also watched the emergence of the influencer, which they don’t trust.

According to recent research, the distrust and distancing of Gen Z with social media has resulted in their generation being the first to have a decline in use of social media. It has also forced social media companies to rebrand themselves to retain this cohort of young people. TikTok says it’s an “entertainment platform.” Snapchat calls itself a “camera company.” BeReal says it’s “not another social network.” Meta says it’s a “metaverse” company.”

This generation prefers visuals over words. The platforms they are drawn to, as reported recently by Pew Research, are You- Tube, TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat. Bottom line, they turn to their screens to be entertained, not to cultivate a personal brand, a meaningful social connection or to tell a story. They are not even using Google to choose restaurants; they are searching on TikTok. These platforms also provide a certain amount of digital privacy and anonymity, which this young cohort craves in a digitally noisy and chaotic world like what they have recently experienced.

Many adults want students to engage in what has been labeled as “presentation culture” and this tail end of Gen Z will not conform. That’s not to say they are all like this; we simply bundle people into generations to study their formative experiences and to understand them better as every person is different. So, what can we do to help these upperclassmen right now? Meet them where they are with the use of social media.

Beyond allowing students to make their own choices about what platforms to be active on and what to share, it matters that they are aware of the part of their personal brand or social footprint, even the one they don’t want to accept, or they are not managing. Encourage students to not only Google their name but to set up a Google alert. If a student has a common name, this may be a perfect opportunity to discuss the simplest form of branding, social media handles.

Students may not want to use their name, and that’s fine, for now. Eventually though, they will want to build a professional network on a site like LinkedIn and begin to establish themselves, as well as differentiate and be discoverable. Maybe. But use of consistent branding across platforms and over time matters; it is how to build a social footprint. Think about using first and last name together, always, or first initial and last name, etc.

Finally, the best course of action with these students is to just ask them. How do you want to express who you are to colleges, coaches, employers or decision-makers? Is it through creativity? Could it be a video showing a day in your life? Could you write an essay even if it is not required? How can you demonstrate comfortably that you are serious about your future and that you want to be a part of the campus community?

It is OK to meet today’s students where they are with sharing on social media. Doing a search and not finding any social media accounts, pictures, posts or stories about a candidate is better than finding questionable material or finding what feels like a contrived story and content to impress the college admissions or selection team. This is a global trend and allowing your students to set their accounts to private, have an unidentifiable photo or name, or to not use a platform at all is likely far healthier.